Temporary buildings that are of interest herein are emergency shelters to be installed quickly as part of relief efforts in response to natural disasters such as earthquakes, tsunamis and tornadoes for examples. Other applications include buildings to be used as shelters, kitchens and hospitals in cities destroyed by war. Temporary buildings that are of interest herein also include buildings that are used for short-term industrial or warehousing purposes on preserved sites amidst the habitats of endangered species. This include all preserved natural sites where traces of human activities are to be erased at the completion of any industrial project.
These temporary buildings are normally built in sections in a metal fabrication shop. Each section is completed with its structural framework, insulation, outside cladding and roofing. Portions of the electrical wiring and plumbing are already mounted with connectors into the walls and ceiling of each section. Each section is folded in a compact mode and transported to the building site by trucks or by ships. These sections are erected by a crane, one section at the time, and connected to each other to form a complete building.
The advantages of these temporary buildings are numerous. They can be manufactured and stored for later use. They can be transported great distances and erected quickly as the need arises. When their uses are no longer needed, the buildings can be taken down and moved away without leaving a big footprint of their installations and uses.
The modular aspect of these buildings is characterized by the use of hinges, articulated braces, electrical and plumbing connectors, shackles and rails. Several documents have been found in the prior art describing folding buildings using hinges, connectors, articulated braces and rails. A good inventory of these documents describing modular transportable foldable buildings is included in the following documents.    U.S. Pat. No. 2,350,904 issued to T. E. King on Jun. 6, 1944;    U.S. Pat. No. 2,751,635 issued to T. C. Donnahue on Jun. 26, 1956;    U.S. Pat. No. 3,348,344 issued to L. Tatevossian on Oct. 24, 1967;    U.S. Pat. No. 3,443,344 issued to C. W. Williams, Jr., on May 13, 1969;    U.S. Pat. No. 3,475,872 issued to J. H. Suhr on Nov. 4, 1969;    U.S. Pat. No. 3,712,006 issued to Karl J. Bea on Jan. 23, 1973;    U.S. Pat. No. 4,221,087 issued to C. F. Lowe on Sep. 9, 1980;    U.S. Pat. No. 4,545,171 issued to Harry Colvin on Oct. 8, 1985;    U.S. Pat. No. 5,461,832 issued to G. A. Smith on Oct. 31, 1995;    U.S. Pat. No. 6,253,500 issued to T. Gyllenhammar on Jul. 3, 2001;    U.S. Pat. No. 6,763,633 issued to Roger Côte on Jul. 20, 2004;    U.S. Pat. No. 6,968,653 issued to J. A. Stapleton, Jr. et al., on Nov. 29, 2005;    U.S. Pat. No. 7,290,372 issued to Ingo Aust et al., on Nov. 6, 2007;    U.S. Pat. No. 7,841,136 issued to R. C. Czyznikiewicz on Nov. 20, 2010;    US Publication 2012/0180404 published by A. Scouten on Jul. 19, 2012;    JP 2004-183363 issued to Fukada Yoshinori on Jul. 2, 2004;    GB 1,199,959 issued to David Folkes Jul. 22, 1970.    CA Publication 2,649,795 published by R. M. Gibson on Nov. 15, 2007;    CA Publication 2,726,921 published by George Minko on Dec. 30, 2009.
Although the prior art is relatively fertile with suggestions about foldable buildings, there remain some inconveniences and disadvantages with the prior art configurations. For example, these buildings require excavation and levelling of a mounting surface with bulldozers, construction of a concrete floor including digging of foundation pads. Such activities are known for causing mud to leach into nearby streams, for releasing dust over fruit crops, and for destroying vegetation over a construction site that is three to four times the size of the building being built. Other disadvantages with foldable buildings of the prior art are the difficulties with the alignment of their sections with each other, and the weakness of the connections of these buildings to their foundations.
Therefore, there is a need in the field of portable buildings for a better concept for assembling and disassembling temporary buildings. More particularly, there is a need for a system for installing very large temporary buildings effectively without leaving significant damage to the building site.